Magic Messaging: Top 4 Spots to Talk About Your Brand Values
If you’ve defined your brand DNA and created language around your brand values, you might be wondering … “Now what?”
It’s time to showcase your brand DNA in your ongoing marketing. Because having a nifty internal document is well and good. But the real magic only happens when your audience knows what you stand for. That takes consistency.
- What core principles guide your work and your business’s decisions?
- What positive impact are you trying to make on your industry, your community, or the world?
- What philanthropic efforts, partnerships, or social initiatives are you involved in?
These are all messages that should show up regularly in your content. In this blog, you’ll get an overview of the four most important places to implement values-based marketing and tips for creating content that showcases your brand DNA.
Social media: Build community and spark interactive conversations
Social media is a powerful marketing tool for building community and bringing in top-of-funnel traffic. Consumers are already spending tons of time on these platforms. By consistently showing up with a memorable message or helpful information, you create little points of connection that can go a long way. The commenting features on social media are also unique, allowing your audience to voice their own opinions, ask questions, or show support.
There are many options for platforms out there. You’ll want to choose the ones that work best for your business (i.e. where most of your ideal customers are hanging out) so you don’t spread yourself too thin:
- YouTube
- TikTok
- Snapchat
Whether you focus on fun and engaging TikTok videos or informative, friendly LinkedIn posts, your brand values should shine in your presence there.
The key is to nail down a solid values-based social media marketing strategy before you start posting your heart out. Thanks to social media’s spur-of-the-moment capabilities, it’s easy to jump on bandwagons and post about every hot-button issue that hits the airwaves.
But your audience can tell when you’re being authentic and when you’re not. Once you’ve done the hard work of defining your brand DNA and brand values, your goal is to stay the course and not muddy your message.
Speak up when your brand has an authentic stance on an issue or cause. Tell stories that help illustrate your values. Highlight components of your offers that support the things you stand for. Little by little, you’ll see a dedicated following of like-minded individuals take root.
Social media challenge
For your next post, choose one of your environmental or social initiatives. Tell the story of how that initiative started or tell a story of how that initiative has recently made an impact on a real person or community.
Blog: Dive deep into your values and embrace thought leadership
Many business owners think of blogs as a way to improve search engine optimization (SEO) and increase traffic from Google. Yes, that’s a vital role for many blogs, but SEO is not the only thing your blog strategy should prioritize.
A good blog strategy has:
- Content that helps you reach new viewers
- Content that serves existing viewers
- Content that teaches your customer something related to your offers
- Content that helps your audience think about the world in a different way
- Content that helps readers solve a problem and brings them into your marketing funnel
- Content that helps you make a sale
Your brand values act as a common thread linking it all together.
After all, your blog is one of the best places to take advantage of long-form writing. You have space to dive deeper into topics, link to credible resources, and offer something truly educational for your audience.
At Drio, we frequently write blogs that align with our values, whether it’s uplifting woman-owned businesses or…encouraging business owners to stand up for their values in their marketing (hello!👋) Even in your more straightforward how-to content, you can weave in your brand values.
For example, say you’re a financial advisor and want to write a blog about creating a budget. If your brand stands for encouraging work-life balance and self-care, weave that perspective into your tips and tricks. How can someone use a budget to help them find the mental space and rest they need to live a healthy life?
Weaving your brand values into your blog content adds a unique perspective to your piece, setting you apart from cookie-cutter articles covering a similar topic.
Blog challenge
Plot out your next three blog topics. Under each topic, brainstorm a list of angles or perspectives you could potentially weave in that demonstrate your brand values or showcase examples of your social initiatives in action.
Email marketing: Connect deeply with dedicated subscribers
The people on your email list are like an inner circle. Despite the oh-so-common inbox overwhelm, at some point, they made a choice to welcome you into that digital space. Plus, unlike your social media following, you own your email list. You’ll still be able to connect with your email subscribers if Meta goes dark.
This intimate, algorithm-free nature of email marketing makes it a fantastic space to talk about your values with your audience.
Here are a few ways to integrate your brand values into your marketing emails:
- Highlight how your values inform one of your products or services
- Tell stories that illustrate how you’ve lived up to your values
- Tell the stories behind your values—how did a specific cause, event, relationship, or experience inform them?
- Share personal reflections or struggles that align with your values
- Share updates on initiatives and events
- Consider if there are common themes you can carry through your emails
For Drio’s monthly newsletter, we always refer back to our core message and initiatives before plotting the email’s content. We ask ourselves: how does this story/tip/insight illustrate our values or drive home the thing we want to be known for?
Email is your oyster. With every newsletter, promotional email, or story you share, ask yourself: are our brand values reflected in this content?
Email marketing challenge
For one of your next emails, share a personal reflection from someone on your team. Talk about a recent challenge they came up against in their work (or personal life if it aligns with your brand’s voice) and how one of your brand values helped them overcome it.
Website: Take advantage of your most valuable digital asset
As we like to say, your website is your digital home. It’s the foundation of your online presence, the face of your brand, and a critical sales tool. It’s the digital space that most, if not all, of your marketing efforts drive back to, from email marketing and Google Ad campaigns to social media posts.
Needless to say, your brand values should shine there too.
One of the obvious places to talk about your values is on your About page. But, here at Drio, we believe you can do much more than that.
Download our free guide for a detailed breakdown of where you can highlight your brand values on your website.
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About the Author: Hazel Geary
